[game_edu] [Fwd: [igda-qol] Unpaid internships are illegal]

[baylor wetzel]

How disappointing - the school i used to work for worked a long time to
setup an internship program and now all students must take an internship. As
far as i know, none of those positions are paid. Now that i have my own
studio, those students beg me to let them intern for me and i do. Many ask
if they can stick around and help out after their internship is over while
they look for real jobs, and so far we've let them (although the hours they
work vary wildly based on their whim). Guess i'm a bad person :(

Looks like you don't have to pay interns though if you meet certain
criteria. Reid and the NYT article links to six factors that influence the
legality. Paraphrased:
1. intern is getting trained, similar to if they were in school (not doing
real work)
2. trainees benefit from the training
3. no regular workers are fired
4. employer gets nothing out of it (no immediate advantage)
5. interns aren't guaranteed a job when they're done with training
6. you tell the interns they won't be paid

You met those, you aren't an intern, you're a trainee and you don't have to
pay trainees

If i'm doing something bad, bummer. Like most of the small studios that hire
our interns (many of which are created by former students), we physically
can't pay (you write software for free and hope to recoup when it ships). No
one else here gets paid. And since they only work 10 hours/week, the work
often needs substantial revision and we have to fill out forms for each of
them every week (which is time consuming), it would be hard to justify
spending what little capital we have on interns. We pay for dinner at the
weekly meetings and devote a portion of their time to polishing their
portfolios to help them get good jobs when they graduate

i certainly think people should be paid fair wages. But the reality is that
small businesses like me in an industry like games where revenue is
back-ended, i'm not in a position to pay anyone, including all the family
members that got drafted. Not sure where that leaves us. i suppose it means
we just stop taking interns

Sorry everyone we exploited :(

-b



On Mon, Apr 5, 2010 at 4:47 PM, Sheri Rubin
<sheri at designdirectdeliver.com>wrote:


>  Hi All,

>

> Reid asked to share the below with you all - here you go!

>

> Sheri

>

> -------- Original Message --------  Subject: [igda-qol] Unpaid internships

> are illegal  Date: Mon, 5 Apr 2010 14:34:20 -0700  From: Reid Kimball

> <reid at rbkdesign.com> <reid at rbkdesign.com>  Reply-To:

> igda-qol at yahoogroups.com  To: igda-qol at yahoogroups.com

>

>

>

> Hi,

>

> I wrote an article about what I'm afraid could be a common occurrence

> in the video games industry, illegal unpaid internships.

>

>

> http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/ReidKimball/20100405/4853/Watch_Out_for_Illegal_Internships.php

>

> If anyone is on the Education SIG, I think they would benefit most

> from reading this. Please share with them (I'm not on the list).

>

> Thanks,

>

> Reid Kimball

> Game Designer / Writer

> http://game.rbkdesign.com

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